As Richard Hatzfeld writes on Impatient Optimists, breaking through the clutter of global health propaganda is “like asking someone to pick out the sound of a pin drop in a room full of tambourine-clanging kindergartners.”
The pin dropping in this scenario is End7, a nonprofit organization on a mission to end seven Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTD’s) by 2020. Earlier this year, End7 released a new video that begins with international celebrities reacting to the visual horror of NTD’s.
Let’s talk about what NTD’s are first. NTD’s, which affect 1 in 6 people worldwide, prevent children from going to school. They prevent parents from going to work and supporting their families. These diseases push impoverished communities deeper into poverty.
NTD’s comprise of diseases such as:
– Schistosomiasis, also known as Snail Fever, the 2nd leading parasitic killer after malaria
– Lymphatic Philariasis (elephantiasis), the massive swelling of limbs and genitals
– Trachoma, an infectious leading cause of blindness, characterized by white lumps in the upper eyelid and eyelashes curling inward
Not to mention river blindness, roundworm, hookworm, and whipworm – End7 promises that all 100% of donations will be given to treatment programs for these diseases.
This isn’t a mainstream health issue. The U.S. hardly even recognizes this as a health issue due to lack of public awareness and thus, its absence from top health policy discussions. Upon recognizing this, the Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases launched the End7 campaign and promptly took its first step to mass public awareness – by showing the video to international celebrities, like Emily Blunt, Priyanka Chopra, & Tom Felton. Reflecting its inherent effect, the video’s name became “How to Shock a Celebrity.”
End7’s video campaign bluntly highlights the underrated power of sight. Look, it tells us. These diseases are real. They’re terror inducing, and they exist halfway around the world from your neighborhood. What you’re feeling is clearly a normal reaction. Do something about it.
Do what? Watch the video. Share it. Become part of the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.
Show it to your friends, your family, your co-worker who also eats lunch at her desk.
Maybe even show it to a celebrity.
– Shraddha Anandpara
Source: Impatient Optimists
How To Shock A Celebrity
The pin dropping in this scenario is End7, a nonprofit organization on a mission to end seven Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTD’s) by 2020. Earlier this year, End7 released a new video that begins with international celebrities reacting to the visual horror of NTD’s.
Let’s talk about what NTD’s are first. NTD’s, which affect 1 in 6 people worldwide, prevent children from going to school. They prevent parents from going to work and supporting their families. These diseases push impoverished communities deeper into poverty.
NTD’s comprise of diseases such as:
– Schistosomiasis, also known as Snail Fever, the 2nd leading parasitic killer after malaria
– Lymphatic Philariasis (elephantiasis), the massive swelling of limbs and genitals
– Trachoma, an infectious leading cause of blindness, characterized by white lumps in the upper eyelid and eyelashes curling inward
Not to mention river blindness, roundworm, hookworm, and whipworm – End7 promises that all 100% of donations will be given to treatment programs for these diseases.
This isn’t a mainstream health issue. The U.S. hardly even recognizes this as a health issue due to lack of public awareness and thus, its absence from top health policy discussions. Upon recognizing this, the Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases launched the End7 campaign and promptly took its first step to mass public awareness – by showing the video to international celebrities, like Emily Blunt, Priyanka Chopra, & Tom Felton. Reflecting its inherent effect, the video’s name became “How to Shock a Celebrity.”
End7’s video campaign bluntly highlights the underrated power of sight. Look, it tells us. These diseases are real. They’re terror inducing, and they exist halfway around the world from your neighborhood. What you’re feeling is clearly a normal reaction. Do something about it.
Do what? Watch the video. Share it. Become part of the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.
Show it to your friends, your family, your co-worker who also eats lunch at her desk.
Maybe even show it to a celebrity.
– Shraddha Anandpara
Source: Impatient Optimists
WHO Raises Awareness on Indoor Air Pollution
The luxury of an oven fan or electric stove is out of reach for many poverty-stricken countries in the Global South, necessitating the use of charcoal as a primary source of fuel for cooking. Unfortunately, charcoal-fueled cooking releases pollutant-laden smoke that, without proper ventilation, can lead to chronic air pollution-related health problems later in life.
The number of hazardous pollutants released in the smoke in staggering; containing carcinogens such as benzene, pyrene, and toxic chemicals such as formaldehyde and nitrous oxides. Sadly, the diseases that result from frequent exposure to indoor air pollution are just as severe, ranging from acute lower respiratory infections, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), lung cancer, and asthma. Additionally, because the societies that use such materials for fuel have most of their meals prepared by females, air pollution disproportionately affects the women and children of the household.
The WHO, in cooperation with UNICEF and USAID, is actively working to educate target publics about the dangers of indoor air pollution. Additionally, by raising awareness of the health problems caused by indoor air pollution with various NGOs and development agencies, a realistic policy in finding practical fuel alternatives to charcoal and other hazardous materials can be identified and implemented.
– Brian Turner
Source: WHO
Photo: Howstuffworks
Faces Of Africa: Making Africa Laugh
Nigerian comedian Bowoto Jephta, more commonly known by his stage name Akpororo, attributes his success in comedy to poverty stating that it forced him to recognize his own talents. Besides comedy, Akpororo is well known as a singer planning to release his music album next year. Akpororo who used to be a choir member receives inspiration from the Bible and the church. Most of his jokes, he says, are “about pastors and madmen because in my church they cure madmen.” He currently resides in the Niger Delta region where he lived before his break into comedy saying that he wants to give hope to the youth. Everybody in Niger Delta, he says, is a comedian.
Kenyan Erick Omondi and Ugandan Patrick Salvador are two comedians who both starred in an event called the Battle of Migingo, a competition that pitted Kenyan comedians against Ugandan comedians. Members of the audience were in agreement that regardless of who wins, the expectation was to laugh and have fun. Salvador comments that the importance of comedy in Africa is to show that there is much more to Africa than war and poverty.
Nigerian Oke Bakasi McAntony comments that there is much growth and development occurring in Africa and lives with the philosophy that “Life is just about happiness.” He says that “It is an irony that they say we are the happiest people. Maybe because our shock absorbers are too tough.”
– Rafael Panlilio
Source: Huffington Post, Tribune
More Midwives Needed in Nepal
These declines, similar to those seen in countries such as Bangladesh, Malaysia, and Thailand, are cause for hope. However, health care experts say the gains in Nepal are unsustainable if the country does not address its need for more health care professionals, especially midwives, to prevent women from dying in childbirth.
Declines in maternal mortality rate are attributable to a number of factors other than improved health care access or services. Nepal’s paradox is that even though the MMR is decreasing, access to skilled birth care is still very low. In general, improved health care positively correlates with reduced MMR, but sub-Saharan Africa and Asia have not demonstrated a strong correlation so far due to lack of skilled birth care.
Experts in maternal health do not have the data necessary to determine the exact causes of the decline, but there are multiple factors involved. The top reasons are the social empowerment of women, reduced fertility, and government health care programs. Nepalese women are now having fewer children on average, and have more access to contraception and family planning tools. Women’s life expectancies and literacy rates have increased as MMR has declined. Women are now also offered financial incentives to seek medical care during pregnancy and have more access to affordable, life-saving health care such as blood transfusions.
Nepal is on track to meet its Millennium Development Goal of reducing MMR by 75 percent, to 134 deaths per 100,000 live births. When it reaches that point, the country will require the help of more midwives and health care workers trained in birthing to further reduce maternal mortality. A 2012 UN study found that a midwife in attendance during birth can reduce up to 90 percent of maternal deaths.
– Kat Henrichs
Source: IRIN
Photo: Midwife Ramilla
UN Pushes Arms Trade Treaty
Historically, arms control treaties have been far more successful in restricting weapons of mass destruction than small arms. The Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty has been largely successful since its inception, and the UN wants desperately to reduce the number of deaths from armed violence worldwide, which totaled over 500,000 in 2011—largely due to easy access to firearms.
The biggest obstacle to such a treaty would likely be opposition from the United States. In 2008, the Supreme Court ruled that the Second Amendment explicitly protects an American’s right to own a handgun, in the case District of Columbia v. Heller. The proposed Arms Trade Treaty would require all countries to adhere to a universal standard on regulating the sale of firearms, and while such a change is not guaranteed to force significant modifications upon US policy, the cessation of autonomy on such a divisive issue has already created a fire in the belly of American gun advocates.
– Jake Simon
Source: UNDP
Photo: The Commentator
Get Water: A Game That Tackles Global Problems
The main character is Maya, a young girl who wants to go to school but can’t because the need for clean water for her family is more urgent. Players collect clean water and avoid touching the dirty one, running through a village until a peacock, turtle or football breaks their pot. Rather than trade in coins or cash, players trade in pencils symbolizing education for abilities such as Hyper Hydration, Fancy Filter, and Purification Tablets. The game is not just a testament to the need for access to clean water; it also compels us to ask questions concerning human rights and social justice issues, education and gender rights. Through our phones and devices, we get a glimpse into the life of those who are without access to clean water.
This is the first game made by Decode Global, a Montreal based startup founded last year by Angelique Manella. Manealla’s goal with it was to develop a fun and engaging game that would spread awareness on social issues and prompt global change.
– Rafael Panlilio
Source: Forbes
World Poverty Still Urgent
The documents, outlining “A common vision for the World Bank Group,” introduced two new goals to guide the bank’s development work: reducing the percentage of people living in extreme poverty to 3% globally by 2030 and promoting “shared prosperity” by monitoring the income growth of the bottom 40% in every country.
Critics say the “shared prosperity” target merely expands the bank’s focus on the world’s poorest people rather than shifting it to tackle inequalities and growing gaps between rich and poor.
David Woodward, the fellow at the New Economics Foundation and previously an adviser at the IMF and World Bank, said the documents reveal a “business-as-usual scenario, with little or no change in the basic thrust of its development approach”. He said the documents showed the bank is still subordinating development goals to an overall economic growth agenda. “What we’ve still got is a global version of trickle-down economics,” he said. “We should not be designing policies promoting growth on the assumption that this will deliver everything else.”
Nuria Molina, policy director at Save the Children UK, said the targets were “very unambitious”. “The narrative is right, the terminology is right, but the devil is always in the details,” she said. To address inequality you must also rein in growth at the top, she argued. “You need to have a meaningful measure, and just looking at the bottom is not sufficient. It’s very important to look at the gaps.”
“Increasing the income growth of the bottom 40% in every country will necessarily require accelerating the pace of overall economic growth,” Woodward said the goal to reduce to 3% the share of the world’s population living on less than $1.25 a day would still leave 200 million people in extreme poverty.
Alex Cobham, a research fellow at the Center for Global Development in Europe, said the document was “disappointing.” “What this document says is we’re not going to look at ratios. It feels very much against the flow of where the global conversation has gone,” he said.
World poverty is still urgent. It is a very big issue that needs to be fixed whether the world economy is good or bad. And that is also the whole world’s task, for which we cannot just depend on the World Bank. It may not reach our expected level but maybe this is a signal to tell us we need to find more ways to solve or change the situation about world poverty.
– Caiqing Jin (Kelly)
Source: Guardian
Photo:Flickr
Thankyou Water
Flynn discovered that many people around the world not only lack access to water but also that water is usually unsafe and unsanitary to drink to the point that it may cause serious illness. Flynn also found that Australians are a part of a 600 million dollar bottled water industry. Flynn’s project to tackle the global Water Crisis gives all its profit to fund safe water projects all around the world.
For over three years, Flynn and four other college students, volunteered and managed part-time jobs to cover their costs of living. This year marks the enterprise’s fourth year and the project is showing expansive growth. In December of 2012, Thankyou Water sold its five millionth bottle. Australians are increasingly supporting this project and have switched to Thankyou Water making it their new bottled water brand of purchase. Australians can “track [their] impact” through a newly developed web app where they can see which specific project is being funded by their purchase.
For more information, check out Thankyou Water.
– Leen Abdallah
Source: The Global Poverty Walk
Photo: Google
Kenya is Going Green and Improving Its Economy
One of these initiatives, entitled the Lake Turkana Wind Power project, is a very large proponent of wind-power. In fact, this wind-power project is the biggest in the entirety of Africa. It is set to begin operating this year and is predicted to bring about 2,500 new jobs, as well as protect the environment. This alone is a great success for Kenya. And the Lake Turkana Wind Power project keeps on giving. The creation of an alternative energy source means lower energy costs, making it easier to produce goods and making services cheaper.
Another one of these initiatives, which offers similar benefits to Kenya, is the Olkaria IV Geothermal Power Project. Upon its completion in 2014, the Olkaria IV Geothermal Power Project will add 288 megawatts of power.
Green energy and power sources are desperately needed in Kenya, where polluting fuels, such as coal, are the current energy sources. Currently, 80% of Kenyans utilize wood-based fuels for their daily needs. This leads to a lot of waste going into the environment, as well as waste as tons and tons of trees are cut down and only a portion are used in the creation of charcoal.
Finding alternative fuel sources and coming up with the funding necessary to build farms like the Lake Turkana Wind Power project – which is 100% privately funded – is helping Kenya in their move towards being green and creating social equity. A lot of the benefits of such projects require long-term maintenance and support; yet they are important in making Kenya stronger economy.
– Angela Hooks
Source: allAfrica
Photo: EcoMENA
Violence in Myanmar Continues to Spread
Regions of Myanmar have experienced protracted violence, with a majority of the victims being Muslim. Over 150 people have died in the past year as attacks spread inland from coastal areas. Often, police and military units fail or outright refuse to intervene. The national government has ceded some of its authoritarian power in recent years, which had previously helped to quash inter-ethnic violence swiftly. While human rights advocates have been cautiously optimistic about these reforms, the lack of protection for victims of vicious attacks demonstrates how far Myanmar has yet to go.
President Obama has made Myanmar a focus of his travels in Southeast Asia; in November 2012 he was the first American president to ever visit the country. He met with the opposition leader, longtime political dissident Aung San Suu Kyi, who cautioned him against being too optimistic when victory appears close. Mr. Obama’s efforts to foster democracy in Myanmar are reflective of his overarching strategy of diplomacy and engagement with those leaders who he seeks to persuade on human rights issues. Now, as inter-ethnic clashes are on the rise, it is time for Myanmar to demonstrate its commitment to a society that protects the livelihoods of all its citizens.
– Jake Simon
Sources: New York Times, Reuters